Reagan's team took aim at two key entities--the CIA's analytical division and the Washington press corps--with the realization that if the information produced and disseminated by those two groups could be controlled then the insider community of Washington and the broader American public could be managed.
That enabled the Reagan administration to exaggerate the threat posed by the Soviet Union (after Reagan's CIA chief William Casey and his deputy Robert Gates purged many of the CIA analysts who correctly saw a decaying empire eager for accommodation with the West).
Similarly, well-financed right-wing operatives and administration officials worked to marginalize mainstream journalists (the "liberal press") who raised troublesome questions about Reagan's domestic and foreign policies.
What's the result? Citizens are easily misled, and America has become virtually ungovernable:
The impact of these information strategies had deadly consequences even years later, such as when President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney essentially dictated the intelligence "analysis" on Iraq's WMD to the CIA and the Washington press corps fell in line behind the march to war.
Even today, President Barack Obama complains that his options for addressing the nation's growing problems are limited by what he calls the Reagan "narrative," demonizing government.
The presidents who immediately preceded Reagan deserve more credit than they get, Parry writes:
However, if future historians are fair (and that is no sure thing), the re-evaluation of Ronald Reagan should start with a reassessment of the "failed" presidents from the 1970s--Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. All may deserve more credit than they got for trying to grapple with problems that now bedevil the country.
Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
1
1
1
